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Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Isis and Osiris are basically unique among the unions of mythology, being in love from the womb and staying a unit for all time. Because their union was stable, without the drama that drains many unions, they were able to bring about the beginning of the great civilization of Egypt. This scarab speaks of sacred love and primal creativity.

There is a huge lesson here, or moral to the story if you like; when we forget about small personal agendas and pointless irritations, and turn our minds and actions to working together we really can accomplish much and make a difference that counts in the world. Peace and cooperation, is it too much to ask for on this eve of a new year?

"The only thing that will redeem mankind is cooperation." ~ Bertrand Russell 1872-1970

I will be away for 2 or 3 days, here is to a joyfilled and successful new year to us all!

Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Also known as Anubis, Anupu turning up is a message to pay particular attention to health issues, especially those that may be appearing in dreams. He can guide to new knowledge and is a strong protective force.

I can raise my hand and say I did one thing right this week. On the 26th I got a reminder to get rid of all the sweets and rich food left from Christmas. Which I did. Some things went into small packets in the freezer for lunches, and the one thing that was calling my name the loudest, the last of my neighbor's huge homemade cinnamon rolls, went into the garbage. That was tough, and for a moment I thought about Seinfeld's 3 second rule...but I held strong. Gone is gone, my health is more important.

I signed up at SparkPeople right after it started and haven't been back. This is a great idea and a freely given tool at my disposal that I've allowed to lie fallow. Anupu turning up today has reminded me of this site and I appreciate it, I have friends who praise it highly. One lesson I've learned well over the last 2 years is putting the focus on the process of health living garners much better results than focusing on the desired result itself. I'm 25 pounds lighter as if by magic and physically in better shape than I was 15 years ago. Because my focus is on the journey...

Monday, December 29, 2008

Drawing the Temple Scarab foretells or recommends taking time for community or religious service, or alternately, create some type of sacred enclosure within the home. Excellent advice with the coming New Year and what seems to be our eternal and internal compulsion to do/be/get better as a year turns.

I have two of these spaces in my home, both came about by accident but both spaces I treat with great respect because they seem to bring out the best in me when I use them. One is a small odd shaped space which turned out to be just big enough for a rocker and a small table. I've used this space nearly daily for about 10 years as a morning reading area. It is quiet, no one ever bothers the space and with a nice tablecloth and a group of candles burning it makes me feel good to be there. Currently I'm reading The Heart of Yoga: Developing a Personal Practice by T. K. V. Desikachar.

The other spot is the top of a dresser which I call a naturescape because it started with a accidental gathering of things from nature as I was cleaning my office. When I realized these petals, cones, rocks, carried a theme but had no place to live, I added a tablecloth and many more items that had just been stuck hither and yon all over the house. I didn't know I was a nature pack rat until that day. The space holds huge crystal geodes, rocks and minerals, shells, feathers, dried flowers, sand, moss, a fairy door, rosaries, crosses, a tiny pocket shrine, and the most recent addition, a prayer bowl.

Maybe they bring out the best in me because once formed they are treated and tended with respectful intent?

"If you confront the universe with good intentions in your heart, it will reflect that and reward your intent. It just doesn't always do it in the way you expect." ~ J. Michael Straczynski 1954-

Sunday, December 28, 2008

Kheper, in all it's forms, is a multi-use Egyptian root word with many meanings. As today's draw the Scarab indicates potential divine intervention on a current situation, or that I'm on track and should proceed with due vigor. The Khepera or Scarab was from earliest ancient days an agent or deity of the sun; it's shape or image immediate brings to mind Egypt and all things Egyptian.

I remember the first time I felt assured my personal urgent prayer had been answered by divine intervention. We were farm kids and farm kids are expected to do whatever they are capable of regardless of age. When we turned 8 or 9 we were taught to drive the tractor at hay time which freed someone bigger and stronger to help with the wagon loading and unloading. Having that barn full of hay is critical to the survival of a farm. If you can't feed the stock you have no milk or butter, no meat, no fertilizer for the veg garden and next years hay crop.

One summer evening 2 days after the hay field had been cut, I was driving the tractor and my dad was running the hay rake, turning the hay over and pulling it into wind-rows for further drying. Every time I turned and headed east I could see big dark thunderheads piling up...and a heavy rain that week would have meant a ruined cutting. I prayed and prayed and prayed while I drove that tractor...and by the time we were finished those clouds had broken up and dusk arrived with a clear sky. Now, 50 years later, when doubt creeps into my mind I cast my memory back to that answered prayer and my doubts fade away.

"If your heart is full of fear, you won't seek truth; you'll seek security. If a heart is full of love, it will have a limbering effect on the mind." ~ William Sloane Coffin 1924-2006

I've used oracle card decks before here on Quirkeries, but this week is something totally new, Sacred Scarabs by de Traci Regula. The set comes nicely boxed with a 145 page book and a black drawstring bag with thirty different scarab shaped tiles, each impressed with a different shape on the bottom.

Saturday, December 27, 2008

No I don't mean the BBC comedy, but the idea that we do things for appearances sake. This victory celebrant is standing upright with hands on hip and scepter in a moving horse drawn chariot. Where is his stability? Where is his common sense? Looks great at first glance, the crowd is throwing wreaths and branches, the horses are gorgeous, the celebrant has his best Sunday-go-to-meeting duds on but what will that serve him when he falls down?

I'm reminded by this card of false fronts. Pretending we haven't got cancer, pretending we still have all our money, pretending we aren't about to lose our house...pretending we are someone we aren't, perhaps never were. The one and only thing that always has been and always will be true is that we are notalone. There are always other people with the same problems and afflictions; if we will just open up there is much support and help to be had. Forget the pretend victory, step down from the cart, and pick up our lives.

This 1835 Lo Scarabeo reproduction deck has been pure delight to work with this week. Visually rich with symbology, each card will give as much information as the reader is willing to pull out of it. What a shame Lo Scarabeo slapped this sepia back on an otherwise stunning deck. The Classic Tarot is no longer available from Lo Scarabeo's North America distributor, but can be purchased directly from Lo Scarabeo's website.

Friday, December 26, 2008

What an interesting group of cards I've drawn this week, about small mundane everyday life which is exactly what this week and the past have been. I've been snowed in, just me and my 4-footed companions so I've had all the time in the world to putter, work on cleaning up 2008 things, ponder life, review the past year and think about the new one.

I see this Page and combine it with the other cards I've drawn this week and as a life long entrepreneur my nose twitches and my hands itch to get started on another stream of income, but I see the 6 and Queen of Cups and know I have three huge committments that sooner rather than later will require my full attention. I will keep my eyes open for one-of opportunities and bide my time.

"I have always found that my view of success has been iconoclastic: success to me is not about money or status or fame, its about finding a livelihood that brings me joy and self-sufficiency and a sense of contributing to the world." ~ Anita Roddick 1942-2007

Wednesday, December 24, 2008

I always take stock of where I am at the end of a year, get a bead on my goals for the next, try to finish up a few projects that have been hanging, and explore what new thing I will learn or start in the new year. Blogging was my try-something-new thing in 2006 which had a lot of false starts and deletions until I hit my stride and focus late in the year.

I'm reminded by this 2 of Coins that this exercise gives me a clean page for the coming year, gives the current a paid in full stamp and makes my life choice driven rather than a accidental journey. Based on the events of 2008 I fully expect 2009 to be a watermark year for us all, pivotal to our futures.Bring it on.

"Review your work. You will find, if you are honest, that 90% of the trouble is traceable to loafing." ~ Ford Frick 1894-1978

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

The queen of emotions. No black or white here, she loves passionately and hates the same way. If she supports a project she offers physical and financial help. If she is against it she petitions, votes, legislates to get it stopped.

I'm reminded by this card that our passions are what make life worth interesting and a healthy love or hate adds the pepper to our lives; just avoid going off the rails.

"The sign of an intelligent people is their ability to control their emotions by the application of reason." ~ Marya Mannes 1904-1990

Monday, December 22, 2008

Aces are beginnings but take a closer look at this oak limb. It has been downed long enough that the bark is beginning to lift away from the wood. At least a year and considering it is oak it could be 4 or 5 years since this wand was first grasped.

I am reminded by this card at a time of year when we like to make a fresh start, that I've made lots of fresh starts and some of them ended pretty close to where they began, some are nearly complete. So there they lie, unable to go forward without me. Time to clean up as many loose ends to 2008 as possible. I made a huge start yesterday on one and perhaps late today or sometime tomorrow I will be able to put paid to it. Monty will have to wait...

Sunday, December 21, 2008

Every time I woke up last night I made quick notes about my dreams, for a year end spread I'm doing. Veddy interesting...As my 90 year old father in law says, "when I have time" I might make a dream journal.

I'm reminded by this card that souvenirs do not have to be seaside kitch or Remington bronzes, but can be our memories. Much easier to carry around and store. Sometimes they are faulty, or fuzzy, or painful, but we are the sole proprietor and they are ours to draw upon when needed. It is certainly another way to exercise the brain, critical to keeping dementia at bay.

"We all have our time machines. Some take us back, they're called memories. Some take us forward, they're called dreams.". ~ Jeremy Irons 1948-

Another beautiful deck this week from Lo Scarabeo published in 2007. Lo Scarabeo has published a good number of reproductions of ancient and classical decks and I for one, am very grateful. It is certainly the only way most readers could ever hold and use these tarots. The original 1835 deck featured engravings by Carlo DellaRocca of Milan, and was then printed in Lombardy by Gumppenberg.

Saturday, December 20, 2008

There are times when we get busted back to some stage of our lives we thought we'd never see again. I guess foremost in my mind is the Madoff Ponzi implosion that has effectively erased the fortune of many rich people. I read the other day that some of the newly poorish feel entitled to a government bailout.

I'm reminded by this particular Knight that what we've accomplished once we can accomplish again, and it should be easier because we are experienced, right? After all Colonel Sanders was in his 60's, broke, contemplating suicide, when he got the idea for Kentucky Fried Chicken outlets. It's never too late and the Knight says we have everything we need to begin, regardless of our rank.

"Take up one hole more in the buckle if necessary, or let down one, according to circumstances; but on the first of January let every man gird himself once more, with his face to the front, and take no interest in the things that were and are past." ~ Henry Ward Beecher 1813-1887

Thus ends the week with the Tarot of the Cloisters, Created and illustrated by Michelle Leavitt, Published by U.S. Games Systems 1993. 1 to 10, I would give it an 8. The card stock is perfect (printed in Belgium) and even though the cards are four inches wide they are very easy to shuffle. I don't normally read reversals, but with round cards you can't help but note what angle the card is in when it's flipped over and this gives some welcome influence to a reading. My complaint is the cards with faces. Today's Knight of Pentacles is probably the best in the deck. Wednesday's 9 of Vessels is a good example of how jarring the faces are on many cards.

While following straight Rider-Waite imagery Ms. Leavitt has done a good job in giving the reader plenty to work with.

One of my favorites would be the Five of Pentacles. Often shown as a raggedy adult and crippled child in the snow in front of a church, this deck shows a beautiful stained glass window, broken out. To my eye it looks like it was broken from the inside. Was it a shoot out? Was it a bomb? Was it a parishioner fed up with the rules of man? Is it an abandoned church? Would we still find sanctuary? Do we need sanctuary really? Or is sanctuary within?

Friday, December 19, 2008

I unintentionally drew two cards together this morning. I suppose if this happened very often I'd take the top one, or redraw but these boys have something to say to me today. Being a human with feet of clay I sometimes think rushing in where angels fear to tread is a dumb way to live and maybe I should take back some of my serious commitments, just say "oh, I was just kidding...I can't be bothered, falala".

The Page of Staves has the same personality, He thrives on the fire of commitments and self-work, the wand of action is grounded firmly in the ground of committed action. The Page of Swords gives the strength to follow through. Ready for action, not resting on past laurels; if hard times and adversity come he keeps his eye on the horizon, hope, and goals rather than bogging down in minutia.

I'm reminded by these cards that I can do what I set out to do. The only person who could stop me is me, and me is also committed.

"Thou, O king, sawest, and behold a great image ... his feet part of iron and part of clay. ... And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly broken." ~ Daniel 2:33-45

Thursday, December 18, 2008

A pox upon Eliphas Levi and A. E. Waite, Golden Dawn followers, for renaming the fine old suit of coins pentacles. While the word has a medieval meaning of a table or thing with five corners it is forever and ever more firstly a sigil or talisman of magical protection.

My real complaint is why oh why have publishers and artists continued to name the suit of earth and economics and worldly matters Pentacles? Are they just Sheeple, doing something because the last person did it that way? I don't know why we don't rise up and complain. I would think even Wiccan and Witch would think their pentagram is being subverted and dumbed down to represent a coin of the realm.

I'm reminded by this card that worldly actions and results have to start with someone, hopeless though that mission might be. I feel ill-used every time I work with an otherwise great deck that has the coin suit misnamed.

Wednesday, December 17, 2008

I wonder what would happen if one of these cups fell over. Would the other cups follow suit like dominoes or would they brace and strengthen?

I'm reminded by this card that we are faceted creatures, capable of withstanding all manner of disappointments and tragedies, hiccups, windfalls, and dead ends. It isn't karma, it isn't the end of the cosmos, it is just time to pick up our cup, learn from the experience, and perhaps try something different. Sometimes, having it too easy is as big a hindrance to forward motion as adversity.

"People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within." ~ Elizabeth Kubler-Ross 1926-2004

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

We see the word Temperance we usually think relax, chill, let it go. In truth Temperance is the ability to forge new truths. If something is terribly wrong in our life we need to create new solutions. Obviously what we've been doing isn't working.

I'm reminded by this card that by the grace of God I do not live in Darfur, Libya, Uzbekistan, but a place of peace and beauty. I do not have cancer, nor missing any limbs, I have all my senses. I have people who love me, people I could call in an emergency. My home is full of food, we have jobs, we have no bills beyond mortgage and utilities. With that viewpoint in mind, just how tough would it be to change something that isn't right in my life? It is only the forge that is weak...the opportunity is there to create the Temperance needed.

"All of us tend to put off living. We dream of some magical rose garden over the horizon-instead of enjoying the roses blooming outside our windows today." ~ Dale Carnegie 1888-1955

Monday, December 15, 2008

I wonder what Pamela Colman Smith's intent was when she illustrated the seven of cups for the Rider-Waite deck in the early 1900's. When I first began studying tarot I often took this card to mean too many choices or hard choices, I'm more inclined now to see it as inability to focus. The world is our oyster but we have feet of clay.

I'm reminded by this card of the differences between the daily life of my great-grandmother who would have been in her 50's when this card was designed, and my life at 50-something.

For great-grandmother to be distracted she probably would have to physically leave the the house. Church, shopping, social events. When she was home, if it wasn't Sunday she was working like a beaver to keep up with her job as wife/mother/homemaker.

Today's woman of the same age group doesn't even have to get out to bed to be distracted from completion of tasks. Cable TV, computer, Wii, Kindle full of books, X-box, NetFlix, plus most of us have jobs outside the home taking away from energy to finish what we start. And the very fact that being in bed all day has lost the sin of sloth classification it once had. So we start too many things and then claim too busy to finish. I pledge to myself to complete one big task today. Something my great-grandmother would have had finished weeks ago no doubt.

"Modern woman thinks she loses something - time - when she does not do things quickly. Yet she does not know what to do with the time she gains / except kill it." ~ (adapted from) Erich Fromm 1900-1980

Sunday, December 14, 2008

My back has been killing me for two weeks. None of my normal routines for dealing with chronic pain touches it. When my friend Ruth's cancer returned it was in her back, a pain she ignored for 4 months because she had a job to finish and didn't have time to see her doctor. Of course it killed her 18 months later. We currently do not have health insurance, one of America's many great unwashed.

I'm reminded by this card to snap out of it. Pain is one of the three constants in my life, I'm just fine. Give it a rest. What will be will be. It's all in my mind. It's just stress. I'll be laughing about this shortly. Or the ever refreshing parental fix, "Quit your whining or I'll give you something to cry about".

"While others may argue about whether the world ends with a bang or a whimper, I just want to make sure mine doesn't end with a whine." ~ Barbara Gordon, I'm Dancing As Fast As I Can

Tarot of the Cloisters is the brain rinse for last week's Liber T, polar opposites. Created and Illustrated by Michelle Leavitt, Published by U.S. Games Systems 1993. It has been out of print for years, but a little digging turns up still sealed decks...at a price.

Saturday, December 13, 2008

My hackles went up yesterday while looking over a new deck coming out next year, and it is for the same reason I get exasperated with so many others on the market. The female Majors all look like jail-bait Barbie dolls. It boggles my mind that someone who uses or publishes tarot decks would think a teenager full of silicone would ever assume one of those major positions other than perhaps the Fool.

I'm reminded by this Princess and her coin that I can vote with my pocketbook, that our youth can occasionally teach us lessons, and that women of all ages are beautiful. Sometimes they only come into beauty with age, courtesy of life lessons; and that T&A apparently reigns supreme in marketing. What a shame...we've not advanced past caveman thinking even yet.

"Becoming the feminine ideal requires just the right combination of insecurity, exercise, bulimia and surgery." ~ G. B. Trudeau 1948-

My week with the Liber T Tarot of the Stars Eternal has come to an end, and Monday this deck will head to Rhode Island. I know people who think this is the deck to end all decks; I don't like the philosophy behind it and know I won't be using it again. I'm trading for Animals Divine. Something for everyone in Tarot.

Friday, December 12, 2008

Wikipedia has a whole page devoted to equilibrium and the various states therein. We don't have to read it to know someone in a home/job/class has to be the fulcrum, the central point on the teeter-totter.

I'm reminded by this card when there is no equilibrium there is dysfunction and chaos. In my little microcosm of the world it is I that needs to and must provide the calm center and take the lead in decision making. We've all seen families and jobs where several people try to be the control, or where no one will accept responsibilities. The natural result is environmentally fatal to those within the fallout zone.

"Comes a time in each life like a point of fulcrum. When you must accept yourself, when it is no longer what you will become but what you are and always will be." ~ John Fowles 1926-2005

Thursday, December 11, 2008

Looks like El Bandito to me, just coming through a basketball net and into the frying pan.

I'm reminded by this card that some ideas and actions you just need to act on while the thought or urge is fresh in your mind. Procrastination can be a disease if allowed to run the show.

The Procrastinator's Creed:1. I believe that if anything is worth doing, it would have been done already.2. I shall never move quickly, except to avoid more work or find excuses.3. I will never rush into a job without a lifetime of consideration.4. I shall meet all of my deadlines directly in proportion to the amount of bodily injury I could expect to receive from missing them.5. I firmly believe that tomorrow holds the possibility for new technologies, astounding discoveries, and a reprieve from my obligations.6. I truly believe that all deadlines are unreasonable regardless of the amount of time given.7. I shall never forget that the probability of a miracle, though infinitesimally small, is not exactly zero.8. If at first I don't succeed, there is always next year.9. I shall always decide not to decide, unless of course I decide to change my mind.10. I shall always begin, start, initiate, take the first step, and/or write the first word, when I get around to it.11. I obey the law of inverse excuses which demands that the greater the task to be done, the more insignificant the work that must be done prior to beginning the greater task.12. I know that the work cycle is not plan/start/finish, but is wait/plan/plan.13. I will never put off until tomorrow, what I can forget about forever. (Author Unknown)

Wednesday, December 10, 2008

Here we see the central figure eating the heart of the bear which clothed and protected, mindful only of self and instant gratification.

I'm reminded by this card of the current governor in the news whose actions and behavior are those of a B movie Mafioso. It begs the question, how do these creatures get so far and last so long? Surely there are any number of the press who were fully aware of this official's personality; the greed, the coarseness, the deal making. Why do they uber-examine the pointless like Spears and Hilton and Pitt, and turn a blind eye to someone who can harm so many innocent constituents. I'm as disgusted with the media as I am with the voters. As I observed recently, sometimes we get what we need, usually we get what we deserve.

"Madness is badness of spirit, when one seeks profit from all sources." ~ Aristotle 384BC-322BC

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Being Queen must have been a lot easier pre-mass communication capabilities. Yes the word out got eventually about your habits and personality but by that time it was usually far to late to apply any pressure. We smile at Alice's Queen shouting "off with her head" at every juncture, but it wasn't too long ago that empires were run along those lines.

I'm reminded by this card that the world is far from perfect but the sitting Queens I'm familiar with are thoughtful, generous, and care very deeply for their subjects and the future they face together. It may be because they are constantly in the limelight and it is a lot more difficult to put one over on the press, but I'd like to think it is because they are better educated to the job they hold and the ramifications of their actions upon the future.

I wonder how my behavior and actions would differ were I in the constant limelight? I'd like to think, not much.

"What did they know, when did they know it, and what did they do about it." ~ William S. Cohen 1940-

Monday, December 8, 2008

Humm, cheerful deck. But even if we don't like to look at it, think about it, or admit to it, self-destruction seems to run in humans veins.

I'm reminded by this card what hard work it is on both sides of the cross. Difficult to stay clean and sober of bad habits, and difficult to have/maintain bad habits, mental or physical. It's no good laying blame on someone else, and no one else can get us clean, humanity comes at a price.

"Man is the only animal to have created his own environment. Ironically, he is also the only one to have thus created his own means of self-destruction." ~ Ernesto Sábato 1911-

Sunday, December 7, 2008

The Liber T Tarot of the Stars Eternal deck is based on the Thoth system, rather than the Rider-Waite method which I normally use here. The general guidelines for base meanings of each card are seen from a different point of view, one that I'm completely unfamiliar with, having never used this type of deck before.

I'm reminded by this card that change is growth if we will only allow it to be. The entire world will probably not recognize itself a year from now and this card shows that, all out of balance; some seeing it as the end and some seeing it as an opportunity to look for new answers.

"Sometimes a breakdown can be the beginning of a kind of breakthrough, a way of living in advance through a trauma that prepares you for a future of radical transformation." ~ Cherrie Moraga 1952-

Saturday, December 6, 2008

I'm drawing an absolute blank on this card after looking at it for an hour. I even caved and looked to the companion book for help, still no joy in Mudville. I'm wondering where this is that it has no trees on the hillsides. Why one spear rather than nine. Where the boat is the book alludes to. What is to the right that would make someone climb this cliff in the first place.

I'm reminded by this card that sometimes we just do the job because it's there and must be done. Like ironing, changing the car oil, cleaning the barn. There is no glory, no excitement, and shortly the job will have to be done again. The only thing that would gather attention is if the jobs weren't done. Here is to the life tasks that are finished without fail and to those that do them."We are the yeast that leavens our lives into rich, fully baked loaves. When we experience our lives as flat and lackluster, it is our consciousness that is at fault. We hold the inner key that turns our lives from thankless to fruitful." ~ Julia Cameron 1948-

I'll be frank, after a week with this cards, for reading I much prefer Legend: The Arthurian Tarot deck, art and book by Anna-Marie Ferguson, published by Llewellyn. But for in-depth study of the Grail Quest the Hollowquest Workbook that goes with this deck is a good place to begin.

What is more interesting is the cards that have come up in my daily draws, grouped as a whole. They clearly reflect where we are right now in our lives. And that in the end we need to just do it.

Thursday, December 4, 2008

Swords are knowledge and today this card makes me think of unrealistic expectations, of finally parting the curtain that divides between truth and illusion. We feed ourselves plates and plates of wishes and daydreams and then wonder why we are depressed. We think every family gathering will be Little Golden Book perfect and wonder why we get migraines. It is very similar to being a drug addict. The pretend high seems much nicer than real life.

Real life can be wonderful, if we just quit expecting to live like Madison Avenue likes to pretend we do. I'm reminded by this card I'm not perfect, and shouldn't expect anyone else to be either. Barbie Doll doesn't live here but I think I can safely say I like who does.

To free us from the expectations of others, to give us back to ourselves--there lies the great, singular power of self-respect." ~ Joan Didion 1934

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

As we learn about and see the results of global warming, logging the Amazon, giant petroleum spills and the like, it becomes increasingly obvious that world leaders and land stewardship must come together.

I'm reminded by this card that while we expect our leaders to make the big decisions that can save and heal the environment, this is one thing we can also do as individuals. The cup of truth offered by the Lady of the Lake reminds us we can leave a much smaller footprint that we have been.

"Work out your own salvation. Do not depend on others." ~ Siddhārtha Gautama c. 563 BCE to 483 BCE

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

The mother lode of good ideas...still in the back of the brain. We all have good brains, funny how often we have to work for good ideas and solutions.

I'm reminded by this card that Rome wasn't built in a day so why should I expect my own pace to be any faster? I'm only one, Rome had legions to call upon. Relax, breathe, it will all be done in the perfect amount of time, when needed. Keep on keeping on.

"This is my answer to the gap between ideas and action - I will write it out." ~ Hortense Calisher 1911-

Monday, December 1, 2008

Have you ever memorialized a real victory? This is King Arthur's flag, set after he defeated 11 Kings who opposed his rule. We also see statues in parks, names and dates chiseled into building fronts, autobiographies, money and stamps with profiles; and of course the bullyboys of memorialization, designers who stamp their own name on clothing and other products.

I'm reminded by this card that pride in accomplishments is an important part of ego. It keeps us plugging along at less than exciting jobs, keeps our back straight and head held high as we go through our days. And it is nice if we memorialize in some way. For most of us that is photography, a snap of something we can be proud of for our albums and memory.

"Since it is not granted to us to live long, let us transmit to posterity some memorial that we have at least lived." ~ E. Joseph Cossman 1918-2002

Why Cards, you ask?

The cards open previously closed doors to my own heart with their merciless quest for the truth, nothing but the truth. They flay the soul and make me say thank you afterward.Each hour spent with my cards is a new lesson to be learned. Viva la Journey.